Donald Trump finally got around to giving his big I Love Guns speech at the NRA annual meeting in Dallas, and after a rousing welcome, started losing the crowd as he drifted off into the usual Trumpian bullshit. Up top, enjoy Trump endorsing Lyin’ Ted Cruz, whose father was involved in the Kennedy assassination in some city or other. Lots of enthusiastic cheers, and — what’s that? — some boos mixed in there, too. Trump also offered this non sequitur about the Holy Second Amendment:

“Your Second Amendment rights are under siege. But they will never, ever be under siege as long as I’m your president.”

But you ARE the president, and our rights are under siege! But … they CANNOT be under siege as long as you are president! But you say… [intense beeping, smoke comes from ears] Norman! Please coordinate!

Trump managed to get a good old-fashioned USA! USA! USA! chant going when he said we stand for our beautiful national anthem, which was probably the height of his rhetorical accomplishment. The whole speech was a tour through his favorite campaign rally lines, underlining the impression that once he takes office, he’s really going to do some neat stuff. He made a point of telling the assembled NRA folks they were part of an “all time record crowd,” but honestly, whether that’s true or not, it didn’t matter (we’ll know whether it was accurate if he brings Sean Spicer out to insist it definitely was the biggest NRA crowd ever).

After taking credit for low unemployment, Trump thanked Kanye West for doubling his approval rating among African-Americans:

Yep, from 11 percent to 22 percent, which is pretty impressive. Only 78 percent of The Blacks dislike me, I am the greatest! He said “what do you have to lose? And then they all went out and voted for him, or at least a few did, and now he’s more popular with the blacks than ever.

Trump managed to get a great enthusiastic BOO from the crowd when he mentioned the phony Russia witch hunt, and “fake news CNN,” but when he got into the weeds of the latest Paul Manafort story, actually reading the Wall Street Journal to the crowd, they went nearly silent, because What Is Newspaper? Then he said he was a fighter, and the crowd cheered some, but lost interest again — barely even remembering to applaud when he said most news is fake. Trump also explained that fake polls, which are all fake, are the real voter suppression, and then it was time for the ritual re-enactment of election night, and then a sudden veer into killing off Obamacare, and … uh … drilling in the Alaska National Wildlife Refuge? The few cheers were less than thunderous.

Somehow Trump got to foreign policy, where he’s going to be SO MUCH BETTER with ending North Korea’s nuclear program than John Kerry ever was in the Iran deal, because Donald Trump will not ride a bicycle or engage in any exercise whatsoever, because that’s how you break a leg:

When Donald Trump wants to break a leg, he has people take care of that for him. Allegedly!

So, a little red meat got their interest. Then it was time for guns, and Trump explained that while Paris has the toughest gun laws in the world (citation needed, buddy), it still has terrorist attacks, so laws don’t work. After all, 2015 happened and there were a total of 150 deaths and 382 people injured in the attacks on the Charlie Hebdo offices and in the Bataclan nightclub and other targets on November 13. If you’re not cherry-picking France’s worst year, you might also note that,

according to the National Consortium for the Study of Terrorism and Responses to Terrorism, between 2009 and 2014, gun attacks killed just eight. There was just one gun death in 2016.

Aren’t numbers fun? If only France had as many guns as we do, maybe some armed citizen could have shot all the terrorists, exactly like no mass shootings have ever been stopped in the USA.

Then Trump explained the Democrats want to take your guns, and what’s more, your trucks, or something:

President Trump at NRA convention:

"If we're going to outlaw guns, like so many people want to do … we are going to have to outlaw – immediately – all vans and all trucks, which are now the new form of death for the maniac terrorists." pic.twitter.com/kwmjYH2g7Q

Trump explained that England, which banned guns, is very stabby, and there’s blood all over the floors of the hospitals of Knifecrime Island. He said this complete with stabbing gestures, because Donald Trump is 12 years old:

Thank the good lord above there’s an NRA and Ted Cruz and Republicans to keep all your guns safe so you can blow grapefruit-sized holes in victims with an AR-15, so they’ll bleed out before messing up the floors of American hospitals.

The crowd wandered away again after Trump got off on a tangent about how the mean, mean Democrats were “slow-walking” his nominees through confirmation hearings, perhaps thinking he was talking about a bit from Seinfeld. We enjoyed a good laugh when he claimed no other party had been as obstructionist to nominations in history — just after he’d said how pleased he was to appoint Neil Gorsuch to the Supreme Court.

Trump got some cheers for protecting the borders, some cheers for the Wall, but even that was half-hearted. Trump somehow made a sudden turn from immigration to the sins of Jon Tester and “what he did to the admiral,” and got maybe five cheers. At least they booed “sanctuary cities,” although Trump only got a smattering of applause for reprising his “not sending their best” line from his campaign announcement. They barely even got excited about the “savage gang” stuff:

Trump tells the NRA convention that "Democrats and liberals in Congress want to disarm law-abiding Americans at the same time they're releasing dangerous criminal aliens and savage gang members onto our streets." pic.twitter.com/ObYXCsetYh

Trump waved the bloody shirt for all he could, and sometimes the crowd got excited, sometimes not. There were the expected cheers for Trump’s call for stopping school shootings by arming teachers, of course, but only tepid applause for keeping guns “out of the hands of those who pose a danger to themselves or others,” because what if Joe NRA stalks his ex-wife — doesn’t he deserve a gun? “Mental health” got no applause at all, even though Trump repeated it four times. But the armed teachers thing? Bigly applause. And the crowd agreed “gun-free zones” attract murderers (even if they don’t.)

Finally, after praising the armed teachers who love their students and will never, ever, ever make mistakes, Trump wrapped up, praising the brave revolutionaries who kept Texas safe for slavery, and repeated the old “Come and Take It” line, which is why Americans need guns, to protect themselves from tyranny by being ready to massacre American cops, American federal agents, and if necessary, American soldiers. Who have AH-64 attack helicopters and Hellfire missiles:

Once the visits by Trump and by Mike Pence were over, guns were once again allowed on the convention floor, which was a gun-free zone during their speeches, the end.

Writing about a subject is the best
way to educate yourself about it, and when I flick through past work I remember how much
they taught me, if no one else. Mainly they taught me that I didn’t know very much. But they
also taught me that most other people didn’t know much either. Thus, some key themes
which stand out include the illusory control of policy makers, the presumed knowledge of
those looking to them to actively do good, the ease with which we fool ourselves, and how
best to protect capital in the face of such unavoidable uncertainty. -- Dylan Grice